Take your 2 x 3 piece of fabric, fold right sides together the long way, sew. Turn right side out and press with the seam in the middle of the fabric. Press in half to make a loop, baste raw edges together if desired. Set aside.

Lay down the first exterior fabric right side up, place your zipper teeth side down with the zipper pull to the left. Lay one of the lining pieces right side down. Pin if you’d like. Using your zipper foot sew together.

Flip wrong sides together. Next lay your remaining exterior fabric piece right side up, place your zipper teeth side down with the zipper pull to the right this time. Lay the remaining lining piece right side down on top of the zipper. Pin. Sew. Flip wrong sides together, press.

Flip right sides together (be sure to open your zipper about half way now). Tuck in your tab that you made earlier between the exterior pieces of fabric, with the tab’s raw edges facing out.

Sew around entire parimeter leaving a 2 to 3″ opening in the lining for turning.

When I’m sewing around the parimeter, I make sure to push the zipper towards the exterior fabric on both sides when sewing across the zipper (zoom in on the above picture if you need to). Clip corners, trim excess zipper. Pull inside out through the opening. Use chopstick to push out corners. Tuck raw edges of opening in, sew opening in lining shut with small seam allowance, or stitch closed by hand. Push lining into exterior. Press.

Attach your metal key ring, you’re good to go! Stuff in all those gadgets and whatever else you might need, a camera, cell phone, iPod, you name it. Let me know if you have any questions, I’d be happy to help.

94 Responses to TUTORIAL: Lil Cutie Pouches

I am making several of these as we speak. I found your tutorial through One Pretty Thing. These are going to be perfect for gift cards this Christmas. It’s so much cuter to give a cute little pouch like this with the gift inside!

Thanks so much for sharing. I’ll be sure to post a link from my blog.

Oh, and I was wondering if it would be okay for me to give a handful of these to a friend who is trying to raise money for a family in need?!?! They are holding a bazaar to help fund some medical bills, house payments, etc.

I just made this for the first time today! I had the pattern marked as a favorite and was waiting until the perfect time to make it. I am using your birthday idea – I’m giving it to a 4 year old with $4 inside! It was SO QUICK AND EASY!!! I timed myself and I seriously made it from start to finish in 20 minutes!!! I LOVE this pattern!! I will use it over and over again! Yeah for wholesale priced zippers at zipit :D. Thank you so much, Anna! Keep the great ideas coming!!

Good Morning.My husband asked if I would create something he can put his cell phone in while at work (he is not allowed to bring it in to the office). So I am planning to use your tutorial (wish me luck-zippers scare the daylights out of me). Can you please tell me where you purchased your 8″ zippers? I have only seen real long ones at the stores.May I link back to you when I finish?Sincerely ~ Tricia

I just wanted to say Thanks for this great tutorial. It was really quick and easy and it took me less than half an hour to make a little coin purse for my daughter to put her school lunch money in. She is thrilled with it. Thankyou!

Anna! I love these and pretty much everything else you post! I made some as party favors for my little girls birthday party, she loved stuffing them with goodies for her friends. Thanks for the awesome tutorial, love following your blog. I made the clutch too, but forgot to take pictures You can see her party on my blog. http://suchislifephoto.com/blog/?p=292

Just wanted to tell you that i discovered your blog not too long ago & am in love! Thanks so much for all your hard work on these tutorials. I am very new to sewing & this tutorial gave me the courage to learn zippers! And these were so easy that i made 8 of them for gifts over two evenings after the kids were in bed. Thanks so much!

I love this project! But I have a question… I made this last night and couldn’t figure out how to sew around perimeter and leave an opening in the “lining” to flip it around. I had to leave an opening in the extererior fabric. What am I missing?Thanks!

hi anonymous-you’ll start sewing at the lining, go all the way around, and stop about 3″ before you reach the point where you started sewing. Sounds like you just started in the wrong spot… hope that makes sense. anna

I’m thinking about attempting this for a gift next week. (Making my first skirt today has me feeling invisible, I think!) As a novice sewer, can you explain what you mean by “interfaced” on the exterior fabric? Is that just the iron on stuff I’ve seen? Thanks so much for your great tutorials! ~Shannon

this is pretty much the first project i’ve ever sewed! i just finished! and besides being in awe of my new found powers, i want to tell you how impressed i am with your tutorials! your step by step pictures are amazing. i never got confused and that’s saying a lot given this is my first real sewing attempt! thank you!

That tip, sewing around the perimeter and pushing the zipper towards the exterior fabrics… truly MADE ALL THE DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD for me… I’ve been making coin purses for friends as xmas gifts and they never came out right (needless to say that the very detailed instructions I had said nothing for this). Thanks so much for sharing!

This is a great tutorial on putting in a zipper to a lined item. I have been unsewing and resewing from a different pattern, and THIS is the BOMB! Thank you for the great tutorial and the great picturs.

THis is just a thank you note!!!Thank you s9o much! I just finished my first one! Let me congratulate you on how relatively easy your instructions made this project seem. Everything was easy to follow except when I tried to add the second side onto the zipper. It was a bit confusing. (to the get the correct sides facing the right way and stuff) besides that… this is a gorgeous project….simple, easy, and fast!

I had to send you a message. I have never been able to get the zipper in pouches and make it look nice. Your tutorial is awesome. My little pouches are perfect. Thanks so much. Cute little gifts for everyone now.

These are wonderful! I was wondering if it was okay if I used 7″ zippers instead of 8″ zippers. I looked everyone and couldn’t find any 8″ zippers and the ones I did find were $2 more than the 7″ ones.

Hi, thanks for all your hard work!! I appreciate all your tutorials… Made a couple of these little pouches and Theo are beautiful ;-). Just having a little problem with the lining… Sometimes it gets caught up with The zipper… Do you have a solution for it?

That’s so nice of you to say. As far as the zip getting caught in the lining, make sure you press the fabrics away from the zipper really well before you connect them to join the lining/exterior. You can also topstitch along either side of the zipper after pressing as well on that same step!

This is a great tutorial. I made about 8 of these for all my aunts for Christmas this year. I made 3 changes: 1) I didn’t cut the fabric in half and left the finished pouch at 7″x5.5″; 2) I added strips of fabric over the ends of the zipper, which makes it get stuck at the end less and gives a nice finish, and 3) I used D rings instead of split rings. In a couple of the cases, I used the embroidery stitches of my machine to add a pretty top stitch.

I see a couple other people wrote in about the lining getting stuck– the way I should have fixed this permanently instead of with an iron is to overstitch the lining to the zipper to hold it back.

Also, when stitching along the perimeter, I left the 3″ opening at the bottom instead of on the sides. This helped turn it more.

Thank you for this great tutorial! I learned to sew from my mom, but she hates putting in zippers so I avoided it, too. I followed the steps exactly and my pouch came out perfectly! Thank you for helping me conquer my fear of zippers – I see a whole new world of sewing projects opening up.

Thank you for this tutorial…I found it on Pinterest and it is so simple even though it took me a few tries to get it right and I will make more!(your tutorial is great I just didn’t pay close enough attention to what I was sewing, seeing and reading)

I-love-this-tutorial!!!! My daughter is 16 and prefers a zippered keychain wallet over a purse. Her existing wallet has seen better days. So imagine my excitement when I found your tutorial!!! One question: I only have 9″ zippers on hand at the moment. Can I use 9″? Thanks so much.

Just made my first one and will definitely be making more. Thanks so much for such a great tutorial! I only had a 7″ zipper but when I looked through the instructions and saw the extra length was cut off anyway, I just had to be more careful about centering it down against the material to sew and it worked just fine. I love this pattern. Its exactly what I’ve been looking for. THANK YOU!